Stark Towers
by mcnootles
Summary: If Peter's class can take a field trip that exposes him to a radioactive spider, and another that brought him to the scene of an alien kidnapping, the trip to Mr Stark's workplace should really have been no big deal. Then again, not much had gone as Peter hoped lately.
1. chapter 1

Peter groaned as he tried, once again, to get his aunt to drop the subject. Somehow, she had found a letter requesting parental permission for a field trip - a trip Peter most certainly did not want to go on - and now she was insisting on his attendance.

"And you just hide the letter from me? Do you realise how that _looks_ , Peter? It's bad enough, the looks I get from the rich housewives at your school for being a single woman raising a teenager, but now apparently I don't care about you education!"

Oh, yeah. She was also quite upset.

"I'm sorry, May," Peter cried, never happy to see the woman who raised him like a mother in anything other than a state of contentment. "It's just, you know, I don't wanna go and I thought you'd make me-"

May crossed her arms. "That's another thing. Why don't you want to go? You intern there, surely you'd enjoy it. You idolise Tony Stark for God's sake."

 _Because I'm Spiderman_ , Peter wanted to say. _And Tony Stark thinks he's funny to drop hints just to annoy me._ Instead he just set his jaw and glared at the ground. "I don't know."

"Fine. Don't tell me. But you're going on that trip. I'll hand the letter in myself."

Aunt May forgave him within the hour, but her decision had been final, which led to Peter closing his eyes and refusing to move as the minibus pulled into the parking lot of their destination.

"Penis Parker!" Flash called again from the back, laughing with his friends as they saw Peter's back tense up, trying to ignore the hated nickname. "It's not too late to back out now, you know. Maybe if you go home now you can keep pretending you're special."

Gritting his teeth, Peter dug a cap out of his bag and stuck it on his head. It may not have been the best disguise but, hey, glasses worked for Clark Kent. He didn't think anyone they'd run into on the trip would recognise him - he worked mainly on the upper floors, which were riddled with security, whenever he was ever actually in the office - but he couldn't be too sure. Tony had set a rule that Peter's presence was to be reported to him whenever he made an appearance, and Tony really liked embarassing Peter.

Ignoring the hounding and jabs from the idiots pushing their way off the bus, Peter slowly got up and stood next to Ned outside, waiting for their teachers to collect the passes.

"Dude," Ned said, looking at Peter like he was stupid. "Why don't you just show him your card? You've got, like, level-one thousand clearance or something; it'd totally shut him up."

Peter shuffled slightly, ducking his head behind Ned as a car pulled up and a couple of scientists got out. He gave Ned a long-suffering look. "Are you kidding? He'd cause a scene, and then Mr Stark would show up, and then I'd never be able to live it down that I take field trips to his company."

Ned nodded, not really understanding why his best friend was so bothered. It wasn't like Peter hadn't already expressed his undying love and hero-worship for the billionaire.

Miss Warren came back and started handing out badges, lecturing on good behavior as she did so, and so completely missed the sight of Flash Thomson laughing and pushing Peter Parker into the metal detector with his keys still in his pocket. The alarm, however, she did hear. It was impossible not to. Loud, obnoxious blaring filled the air, red lights strobed, and the shouts of two dozen security guards dwarfed it all.

Everybody turned, slowly, to see gangly Peter Parker sitting in the middle of it all, a terrified look on his face and his phone slipping out of his fingers onto the floor.

"Um, sorry?"

After that it was a bustle of chaos, resulting in the students of Midtown sitting in the lobby while Peter faced a _very_ intimidating security guard.

"You trying to break in?" The guy asked, leaning right into Peter's face. He cringed. The dude's breath smelt like tuna.

"What? No, I tripped."

"Trying to sneak in a phone? Take a few quick 'Snapshots'?"

Peter blinked, thoroughly confused. "Snapshots? What're... I mean... Oh, do you mean Snapchats?"

The guard flushed. "Listen here, punk, you better drop the attitude or I can take you down to the station. I gotta lotta authority with the boys down there."

He flashed Peter his security badge with what appeared to be pride, though Peter seriously doubted his amount of influence. Still, who was he to know what kind of bribes the police took? He was the one doing their damn job for them half the time.

"The station? Oh man, I can't go to jail! What's that gonna look like on my college applications? Come on, dude, cut me some slack here. I'm wearing a t-shirt with a science pun on it, do I seem cool enough for jail to you?" He sounded pathetic, even to his own ears, but May would almost certainly murder him if he was within a mile of being arrested.

Thankfully, Ned was to the rescue, as always. "He works here," the boy blurted out, running into the room panting. "Swipe... swipe his card."

The guard looked decidedly unimpressed. Peter didn't blame him; who'd believe a fifteen year old kid worked at a multi-billion dollar company. "You work here, kid?"

Peter nodded slowly, unsure of how to get out of this situation. He took his cap off; it wasn't like he needed it now. "Intern. I, uh, I intern here."

A resigned look on his face as he had to play out the facade, the guard held his hand out. "You got a clearance card?"

No matter what anyone said, Peter totally didn't fumble as he retrieved the electronic from the bottom of his bag. Nor did he drop it. Onto the guard's foot. It's... it's fake news, man.

Shock flooded the guard's face as he scanned the plastic, and he looked at Peter in a totally new light. "Level twelve?" His voice was skeptical, which was kind of offensive considering the dude worked for a tech company but didn't know what _Snapchat_ was. Old people, seriously.

"I get, uh, coffee. For people, not for me, because people say when I have coffee I get way too jumpy and I'm already so exhausting that enough's enough so I'm not really allowed coffee anymore. But the people I get it for are. Allowed, that is. To drink coffee. But they're probably allowed to do a lot of other stuff too, now that I think about it, because," Peter shrugged helplessly. "Level twelve."

For some reason the tuna-breath's face became even more skeptical. This time Peter couldn't blame him; that had sounded very unconvincing.

"Did you steal this? That's a felony, punk, I'm calling the cops."

Yeah... _really_ not convincing.

Peter spluttered, holding his hands up in defence as fish-face clamped his hand on his shoulder. "Whoa, woah, woah, woah, woah! You couldn't do some kind of facial recognition scan or something? Come on, dude, this place belongs to Tony Stark, you're telling me Apple beat him to face scanners?"

Nemo eyed him up. "You got one chance. If Marge down in reception doesn't recognise you, I'm taking you in."

"Okay," Peter said frustratedly. He had no clue if Marge would know who he was but if she didn't he could always get Ned to cause a distraction once they were out in the open space, not a tiny cell-room.

Marge had no clue. Really, Tony needed to get better receptionists because this one was a witch.

Thankfully, modern technology could beat the hell out of witches.

Peter really hadn't wanted to do this but Marge was glaring and he could see Flash laughing from the sofa and he really, _really_ didn't want to go to jail. "F.R.I.D.A.Y!"

There was an awkward pause, in which Flash yelled something about Penis Parker belonging in a mental asylum if he thought a day of the week would save him, but it wasn't actually more than like four seconds before a feminine voice rang out of nowhere, totally saving Peter's butt.

"Mr Parker. You weren't scheduled to come in today."

Flash looked absolutely gobsmacked and Peter was loving it.

"Yeah," he said, overly casual. "I'm not here for work stuff, thanks, F.R.I.D.A.Y, I'm on a field trip with school. Hey, any chance I might get away without, uh, the boss hearing about it?"

"I'm sorry, Mr Parker, but I'm afraid Mr Stark has already been notified. Is there anything else I can help you with?"

Peter wracked his brain on who could possibly stop Tony from ruining his entire life. "Do you know where Miss Potts is? She's usually here at this time, right? As CEO? Can you please call her?"

"Of course, Mr Parker."

Awkward and red-faced, Peter shuffled back over to his classmates, who looked incredibly impressed. Well, most of them anyway. Questions were flying at him from every direction, but Flash and his buddies were totally the worst. "Parker! Hey, Penis Parker! Think you're too good to talk to us now, huh? Because you get a robot coffee a couple days a week? It doesn't change anything about you, _Penis_ , except that you do menial labour while I'm-"

"Excuse me?"

Tony hadn't been paticularly loud, but he hadn't had to be. At the sound of Iron Man's voice, Flash stopped talking immediately.

"You... You're Tony Stark!"

"Congratulations," Tony said drily. "Great observation there. The guy who owns a company is at his company, real shocker there. Don't let me interrupt me, go on with whatever it is you were just saying about my intern."

"Your intern?"

"Well, now you're just copying me." Tony looked at Peter. "You see that? You see how he just... Does he know how to spin his own sentences yet or are you advanced for your age group?"

"I, uh, he knows how to speak, Mr Stark, I promise. Most teenagers do. You do know that, right? I just... oh, you were being sarcastic. Sorry," Peter stammered out, glancing awkwardly in between his classmates and his mentor, who was currently pinching the bridge of his nose with a disgruntled sigh.

"Yes, kid, I'm aware that teenagers have the ability to speak. Jesus, for a guy with a genius IQ you can be exceptionally stupid sometimes. You sure you're not on drugs?"

He was answered, not by Peter, but by a brisk redhead who entered the room with a frown on her face. "If he is, he's not allowed to stay over tonight," Pepper said as she handed her sheaf of paperwork to Tony. "You should be in a meeting."

The superhero shrugged, pointing an accusatory finger at Peter. "He should be in school."

"He is in school, Tony. He's on a field trip. We spoke about this."

"Yeah, speaking of, I thought the lower floor labs were supposed to become kindergarten, not the lobby," Tony said, casting a glare at Peter.

Miss Warren rushed over to apologise to the prominent billionaire, sparing no expense on the gushing. After half a moment, Tony held up a hand in interruption, already bored with the ego boost. "Alright, I'm done. You guys go... look at robots or whatever. Kid, you're with me. It's not like you need the tour, and I've got a couple things I wanna try out with you."

Pepper rolled her eyes as Peter grinned and rushed after her fiancé, giving Ned a rusged, apologetic pat on the back on the way past. Honestly, parts of her were proud at the effort he put into the child, but a lot of her fretted over the future of a boy with such an upbringing. She didn't know what the fallout would be from Peter's class' discovery that he was, in fact, Tony Stark's personal intern, but she sure as hell knew she'd be there to protect him, no matter what.


	2. chapter 2

The field trip had been on a Wednesday, which meant that since Tony had requested May let him sleep over, Peter only had one night to prepare himself before being dropped off in the parking lot of Midtown by an exceptionally surly-looking Happy.

The day itself had sucked. People had either been giving him wide berths and odd glances or acted like they'd been friends for years, presumably to get a chance to meet Mr Stark. He'd barely been able to talk to Ned all day, and MJ had been not-so-silently judging. Apparently she wasn't too fond of Mr Stark's old 'playboy' status and refused to believe he could change.

Worst of all though was Flash. Despite the jokes made at his expense about getting shut down by Mr Stark, he was oddly smug whenever he saw Peter. He obviously had something up his sleeve, but it wasn't until the end of the day that Peter discovered just what.

He'd been leaving the premises with Ned to go to his place and finally build the Lego Death Star together. That was when the real sucky part of the day started. Out of nowhere, they were bombarded by hundreds of photographers and reporters shouting questions at a mile a minute and shoving cameras in his face. Within seconds, Peter had lost sight of Ned, sucked into the whirlwind of chaos.

Let me get this straight: heightened senses aren't great for anything other than fighting. School was barely tolerable with its loud bells and obnoxious teenagers, but this? Way worse. Every nerve in Peter's body was tense; his spidey-senses screaming warnings every second; camera flashes became huge spots of white clouding his entire vision and he couldn't see or smell or hear anything specific because there was just too much. It didn't take long before his lungs felt tight as he struggled to breathe, or even stay upright, about to collapse in a sea of media demons.

Thankfully, Michelle Jones was somehow an extraordinary genius who happened to give just few enough craps about both people and the press to wade into the mess and drag the hyperventilating Peter back into the safety of the school. Peter whimpered softly at the sudden change in environment, his senses going haywire, and Michelle let out a sight. "Breathe," she ordered. "One, two, three - just like that. C'mon, Parker, breathe. Concentrate."

Peter had never been so glad that he had been forced to stay for decathlon practice by Michelle, as otherwise the corridors would have been full of gawping teenagers. As he slowly regained his bearings, sat against a locker, he was distinctly aware that something horrible had happened.

"Michelle?" He asked cautiously, half unsure as to whether he even wanted to know the answer. "Why were there so many reporters?"

She glanced at him, surprise etched onto her features. "You haven't seen?" Grabbing his fallen phone, the girl quickly accessed the internet and typed in his name, coming up with much more than the old stuff about his parents' deaths, and then Uncle Ben's.

IRON MAN'S PRIZED PUPIL... IN THE BEDROOM!

STARK'S UNDERAGE INTERN?

IS PLAYBOY TONY STARK BRANCHING OUT TO THE YOUNGER GENERATION?

Peter stared in horror as the headlines got gradually more and more salacious. "What? Where did they get any of this from? Do people actually believe it?"

Michelle shook her head, saying the name with distaste. "Flash. He was pissed about what happened on the field trip, and posed as your 'close personal friend' for the media. Apparently he's worried about your familiarity with your bosses and late night hours. Hey, you mind if I get a photo of your face? Best distress I've seen all week." Before she had even finished asking, the girl caught a picture, chuckling to herself.

Peter, on the other hand, was freaking out. This kind of media coverage could only be a very bad thing, because Mr Stark probably wanted nothing to do with him now, and even if he did there was a very strong chance he could lose college scholarships, not to mention that a savvy enough reporter could possibly find out he was spiderman. "This is bad," he moaned softly, ignoring MJ. "This is really, really bad."

"Not according to this," Michelle snorted. "Look, Flash says you're really good in bed."

Rubbing his eyes, Peter lunged for his suddenly buzzing phone, praying it was someone who could do something. It was. The growling tones of Happy Hogan greeted Peter as he answered the phone, brusquely demanding the teen meet him out back to be taken to Stark Towers.

Standing shakily, Peter shot a glance at the girl sat cross-legged on the floor, resolutely looking away from him. "Thanks, Michelle," he said warmly.

She sighed. "Whatever, loser. Get out of here." But she shot him a quick pitying smile as he bolted.

Happy looked more disgruntled than normal when Peter leaped into his backseat and slid down to hide from the windows, but there was no grumpy, "Watch the leather," which usually followed. Instead, Peter was greeted by an oddly comforting sounding tone informing him that the windows were tinted, so there was no need to worry about reporters while he was in the car.

Relieved, the teen let out a breath and allowed the tension to leave his body. A smile grew on his face as he peered at Happy, who looked stoically ahead. "Hey," Peter said, much too casually. "How did you know the fire escape you parked by was next to the science labs?"

The car swerved as Happy choked, and Peter was forced to clutch the handle to stay upright. He cleared his throat. "Mr Stark told me you were my secondary client. It's good business to know your surroundings when I'm supposed to protect you."

Peter just smiled. Though he'd never admit it, he knew Happy cared about him. Mr Stark even said they read his reports together sometimes!

The rest of the car ride was spent in silence, but when Peter got out, Happy grabbed his shoulder. "Wait," he groaned, looking like the words were being forced out of him against his will. "I'm sorry, kid. Hope everything goes okay."

Shooting him a shaky thumbs up, Peter slammed the door and stood awkwardly, waiting for a familiar face to tell him what to do. Sure, normally he'd go to the labs, but that was to play around with cool tech. He had no clue what the protocol was for this. Plus, what if Mr Stark didn't want to be around some teenager who makes him look bad anymore? He wouldn't want Peter in the private labs if that was the case.

Just as Peter was beginning to feel awkward just hanging around, he heard someone snapping their fingers and quickly spun around to see Mr Stark motioning him to follow. He looked pissed, which probably wasn't good.

"Mr Stark, I... I'm really sorry, you know... I just-"

He was cut off by Iron Man himself, who had a face like thunder. "You're sorry? I wasn't aware you leaked those rumours."

"I didn't!"

"Then you don't need to be sorry, kiddo, you need to be vengeful. Who was it? Who's this... Flash kid? I've got people looking into him but I'd rather hear it from you."

Peter exhaled a sigh of relief, wanting to almost collapse in the corridor. Mr Stark wasn't mad at him, he was mad at Flash! Maybe, just maybe, he'd be allowed to stick around after this whole mess was over.

"You actually met him, Mr Stark. Last time I was here." So maybe Peter didn't want to have to admit out loud to his idol that he was pathetic enough to be bullied at school, so what? Tony was smart; he could figure it out.

Mr Stark groaned. "Penis kid?" Peter nodded. "Well, now Pepper can cook up something especially devious because there's no way in hell someone with a name as lame as Flash can call Spiderman names."

Grinning up at the billionaire, Peter decided to point out the silver lining of this whole mess. "You called me Spiderman."

"What? No, I didn't."

"You did! Not Spiderling, not Spiderboy - you called me Spiderman."

Tony continued to protest loudly, but Peter was on a high. Mr Stark respected him, saw him as something more than just sone dumb kid. Whatever was going on with the Rogue Avengers and Iron Man, Peter was even more firmly on Mr Stark's side than ever.

They reached Miss Potts' office and Peter had barely stepped through the door before he was engulfed in a hug. May smoothed his hair back and straightened his hair, looking him straight in the eye. "Miss Potts here has been telling me some interesting stuff, Peter. Mind filling me in?"

Peter gulped, his eyes widening. "Uh..." He could only think of one thing. "I'm Spiderman."

The room fell silent. Apparently that had not been what May meant. "She was talking about at school, moron," Mr Stark hissed, and Peter felt his stomach drop. Great, now Aunt May knew.

Sensing an oncoming explosion, Miss Potts was quick to make the best of the situation. "That could work, you know, Peter. If you explain your identity as Spiderman, it would give us a head start on any reporter who'll figure it out, since now that the public eye's on you it's only really a matter of time."

Peter nodded, realising that keeping it a secret now would be all but impossible, and let his shoulders sag. Tony sighed next to him. "Pepper, call a press conference. Peter, I'll have someone find the key to your room and set one up for your aunt - your home may not be safe once your identity's released. In the meantime, why don't you explain things to May."

He clapped Peter on the shoulder and left, Pepper doing the same after grabbing her phone and shooting him an apologetic smile.

"What the fuck, Peter?" Aunt May yelled, apparently having lost her usual bad language stigma. "You could be killed, you understand that? You lie to me and sneak out every night, and for what? Five minutes of fame on YouTube?"

"No!" Peter's initial plan had been to just ride the storm and hope not to die, but he couldn't just let May think he was like some stupid Tide Pod kid. After his outburst, he hesitated, because May started giving him the 'mom look' - you know, the one that makes you want to shrivel up into a ball and die? "That... that's not why."

"Then what is it? Please explain, because I'm currently failing to understand why you could be so stupid!" There was a pause. "I'm waiting for an answer, Peter!"

"...Uncle Ben," Peter muttered, refusing to look his guardian in the eye. "I got these crazy powers when I was fourteen, and I spent like a week just messing around and trying to wrap my head around them. That's why I was out so late the night he died, remember? That's why he came out looking for me, and why he was there when that dude was robbing people. I was right there, you know? I was right across the street and I have crazy senses and I'm stronger and faster than most people, but I just stood there. I just watched as this dude shot him. Uncle Ben died because I didn't do anything. And... and he said this thing, right? Some quote or something, I don't know but he used to say it all the time. 'With great power comes great responsibility.' I have power, May, so I've got responsibility too, because if anyone else dies when I know I can stop it, that's on me too. Just like Ben was."

May sighed, and came over to sit next to Peter. She didn't say it, but with that action Peter knew he was forgiven. He felt horrible for bringing up Uncle Ben, he knew it upset May, but he didn't know what else to say except the truth. "Why didn't you tell me?" She sounded miserable, and Peter felt guilt clench his heart for lying to her.

"I wanted to protect you."

She choked out a laugh. "That's supposed to be my job, Peter. I'm your guardian. Not that I've been doing a great job since you've been sneaking out to fight crime every night."

"Don't say that," Peter said, grabbing her hand as she raised it to her face. "You've been great, May. It's not your fault I became Spiderman... and it's not Mr Stark's either," he added, reading the look on her face. "I was doing it way before he found me, and I'll do it after. All he did was give me a better suit to protect myself."

May smiled shakily, and hauled him up. "Come on," she said. "You've got a press conference to go to."

They walked down to meet Mr Stark together, but May waited outside the conference room, disinclined to talk to reporters. Instead, Peter found himself clutching onto Tony as they entered the loud room full of obnoxious story-seekers, which only grew louder upon the sight of him.

It went silent, though, when Pepper cleared her throat, and eyed the few who refused to settle down. "I'm sure you've all heard the story claiming Peter Parker is Tony's illicit tryst. It has no evidence apart from the ludicrous claims of a high school bully, so to clear things up we're gonna have Peter himself tell you the reason for his internship with Stark Industries. There will be no questions until he's finished talking, and I'm going to request you keep things to a minimum since you almost gave him a panic attack this morning. He's fifteen. Show a little respect, please. Peter?"

She stayed there, a comforting presence as Peter made his way to the lecturn and tried his best to calm his nerves, pretending she was the only one in the room. He took a deep breath.

"I am Spiderman."


End file.
